1955 AC Ace

I took this photograph at the Northern Classic Car Show at Belle Vue, Manchester in September 1985.

It's a 1955 AC Ace and should have the 6-cylinder inline 1,971cc Bristol engine derived from the M328 engine that powered the pre-war BMW 328, though the DVLA record says that its engine capacity is 1,991cc and it is now blue.

AC Ace and AC Aceca

These two cars competed in the Invitation Class of one of the races at the Aston Martin Owners Club's meeting at Oulton Park in May 2002.

On the left is the 1957 AC Ace of Tony Bancroft and on the right the 1958 AC Aceca of Peter Lanfranchi. Both cars have the 6-cylinder inline 1,971cc Bristol engine derived from the M328 engine that powered the pre-war BMW 328.

Old Hairpin, Donington Park

This is a photograph I took from the straight between McLean's Corner and Coppice Corner of the field rounding Old Hairpin Corner on the first lap of the Pre-1961 Sports & GT Cars Race at the VSCC's SeeRed meeting at Donington Park in May 2011.

The two leading cars are an Austin Healey and a Lotus Elite, and as far as I can make out the 12 cars in the photograph are:

44  1955 Austin Healey 100M, Michael Thorne

59  1960 Lotus Elite, Robin Longden

7    1959 Lotus Elite, Brian Arculus

98  1955 Austin Healey 100M, Mark Pangborn

97  1954 AC Ace, Mark Morgan

49  1957 Aston Martin DB MkIII, Jon Gross

18  1955 Austin Healey 100M, Robert Rawe

5    1957 AC Ace, Andy Shepherd

65  1951 Bristol 401 ‘Mitchell Special’, Andrew Mitchell

47  1959 Aston Martin DB MkIII, Simon Jefferies

48  1955 Aston Martin DB2/4, James Campbell

85  1948 Frazer Nash High Speed, Ned Spieker

1956 AC Ace

This car took part in the race for Pre-War/Feltham Aston Martin Sports Cars + Other Pre-War/50s Sports Cars at the Aston Martin Owners Club's meeting at Oulton Park in May 2002.

It's Tony Hill's 1956 AC Ace, with what the programme of the event says is a 2,600cc engine, presumably the 2,553cc 6-cylinder inline Ford Zephyr engine that was fitted to some cars from 1961 to the end of production in 1963.

1957 AC Ace

This car took part in the 20 minute long Pre-1961 Sports and GT Car Race at the VSCC's Richard Seaman Memorial Trophies meeting at Donington Park in May 2011.

It's the 1957 AC Ace of D Emmans, driven in the race by Andy Shepherd. Early Aces were fitted with the 1,991cc straight-6 AC engine, but this car is chassis BE 318, the 'BE' indicating that it has one of the 1,971cc straight-6 Bristol engines. Some later cars were given the 2,553cc Ford Zephyr straight-6 engine.

AC Ace

This car competed in the Drum-Braked Class of the 1950s Sports Racing Cars race at the VSCC's SeeRed meeting at Donington Park in June 2008.

It's the 1955 AC Ace of John Arnold, an early car with the straight-six AC 1,991cc engine derived from the one John Weller designed in 1919 for the AC Six, which was produced from 1920 to 1929. Later versions of the AC Ace were powered by a 1,971cc straight-six Bristol engine.

On 3 February 2016 I showed a photograph of this car at Donington Park in 2005.

AC Ace

This car competed in the race for 1950s Drum-Braked Sports Racing Cars at the SeeRed meeting at Donington Park in September 2005.

It's the 1955 AC Ace of John Arnold, previously campaigned by Ken Rudd's racing team and when H&H Classic Car Auctioneers had it up for sale in 2008 they produced this history of the car. The AC Ace was developed from the Tojeiro Bristol of Cliff Davies and this is one of the early cars, fitted with a 2 litre AC engine while later cars had a quicker Bristol unit fitted. Ken Rudd's team adapted the 2.6 litre Ford Zephyr engine for use in the AC Ace, but not many of those cars were built before Carroll Shelby had the idea of putting a big Ford V8 engine in the car which became the AC Cobra.